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'63 is a great year in my memory as well. I had just graduated from college and my Cardinals had a September hot streak that got them within a game of the Dodgers.

The Dodgers came into St. Louis with Podres, Koufax and Drysdale ready to pitch the Series. A friend and I got tickets to the first game with seats out in the old right field pavilion of Sportsmans Park.

Stan the Man hit a home run #475 (his last) right over our heads, but the the Dodgers eked out a victory and the bubble burst. Stan retired at the end of the season a few days later.

The 1990 All-Star Game was the third, and to date, the latest, All-Star Game played at Wrigley Field. The game was awarded to the Cubsafter lights were installed at Wrigley Field in 1988; since the early 1970s all All-Star Games had been played at night.

The Home Run Derby is one of the most-anticipated events surrounding an All-Star Game today. 1990 at Wrigley Field was the very first such event, and both the players involved and the fans (especially Wrigley ballhawks) were quite excited about the possibilities of dozens of baseballs flying onto Waveland and Sheffield. Unlike the prime-time spectacle of today, the first HR Derby was held during the afternoon.

Unfortunately for everyone involved, a cold front had blown through Chicago the previous evening and the day of July 9, 1990 dawned sunny and pleasant -- but with a strong wind blowing straight in at Wrigley Field. Some of the top home run hitters of the era: Cecil Fielder, Ken Griffey Jr., Bobby Bonilla and Darryl Strawberry -- failed to hit a single ball out of Wrigley.

Matt Williams and Jose Canseco hit one each.

And the event was won by the Cubs' Ryne Sandberg, who hit three. He told the Houston Chronicle (no link available) how he did it:

"The key in Wrigley Field is not to hit the ball too high," he said. "I think the other guys were trying to upper-cut it, and they were getting it up in the wind and it was blowing in. It took a legitimate line-drive home run today because of the breeze. The thing about Wrigley is, the fences aren't that far back, so if you hit a line drive it goes out."

A lesson that could be learned, perhaps, by today's power hitters. Sandberg had his best power season in 1990, slugging .559 and leading the NL in HR (40), total bases (334) and runs (116).

The game itself was almost as much a dud as the HR derby. Weather forecasters had warned that the sunny and cool weather of July 9 would not hold the next day and that the game was likely to be interrupted by rain.

That turned out to be true; the game was scoreless with two AL runners on base in the top of the seventh when a large thunderstorm blew its way through the North Side and the game was delayed an hour and eight minutes. When it resumed, the Reds' Rob Dibble entered the game for the NL and promptly gave up a double to Julio Franco (then with the Rangers) that scored both runners. Franco was later thrown out at the plate trying to score on a Canseco fly to right.

And that was it. The NL had two singles -- one by Lenny Dykstra, the other by Will Clark; that's the fewest hits by a team in All-Star history. Barry Bondsand Tony Gwynn drew walks to provide the only other NL baserunners. Barry Larkin, running for Gwynn, stole second and was the only NL runner who made it past first base. It was likely the dullest game in the history of the series. The only thing that was accomplished of note was that, with the game ending a couple of minutes after midnight, it was the latest ending to a game at Wrigley Field; that mark stood until July 26, 2005; that game was delayed two and a half hours by rain and went 11 innings, ending about 1:25 a.m.

The Cubs would like to have another All-Star Game at Wrigley, possibly coinciding with the 100th anniversary of the team's first season playing there, which will happen in 2016. If Wrigley Field renovations can be completed by then, perhaps it'll happen.

CHICAGO - JULY 1990: (L-R) Managers Jim Leyland of the Pittsburgh Pirates, Don Zimmer of the Chicago Cubs, Tony LaRussa of the Oakland Athletics and Roger Craig of the San Francisco Giants look on during batting practice prior to the1990 All-Star Game at Wrigley Field circa July 1990 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Steve Goldstein/Getty Images)

Babe Ruth taking batting practice at Wrigley Field before Game 3 of the 1932 World Series

Charlie Root

Gabby Harnett

Bill Dickey

The "biggest fairy tale in baseball history" (to quote the late Jerome Holtzman, who was named baseball's Official Historian in 1999) allegedly took place at Wrigley Field in the third game of the World Series between the New York Yankees and the Chicago Cubs on Saturday, October 1, 1932.

The Series featured one of the worst cases of bad blood between the two combatants of any Fall Classic. It started at the end of the regular season when the Cubs voted Mark Koenig, a former Yankee, only a half share of World Series money. Koenig had been called up from the minors on August 17 to replace regular SS Billy Jurges, who had been shot by his fiancee. In 33 games, Koenig hit .353, exactly 100 points higher thanJurges, and sparked the Chicago stretch run.

The Yankees considered the vote unfair to their old teammate and, led by Babe Ruth, derided the Cubs as "cheapskates." As a consequence, there was more bench jockeying and shouting of insults at the other club than usual during the first two games.

After New York took the first two games at Yankee Stadium, they faced a hostile, overflow crowd of 49,986 in Chicago for Game 3. As Ruthwarmed up in RF, fans threw lemons at him and castigated him continuously.

Babe retaliated by swatting a three-run HR deep into the RCF bleachers in the first inning off starter Charlie Root. The next time up, he flew out to RF KiKi Cuyler up against the bleachers.

By the time the Bambino stepped into the box with one out and none on in the fifth, the Cubs had tied the game at 4. What happened next is the most famous at-bat in history.

As Babe approached the plate, "a concerted shout of derision broke out in the stands, a bellowing of boos, hisses and jeers. ... From the Cubdugout came a series of abuses leveled at the Babe." (Richard Vidmerin the New York Herald Tribune the next day)

Vidmer again: "Root whistled a strike over the plate. Joyous outcries filled the air and the Babe held up one finger as though to say, 'That's only one. Just wait.'"

After two balls, Root quick-pitched Babe for strike two. "The Chicagoplayers hurled their laughter at the great man but Ruth held up two fingers and still grinned, the super-showman."

"On the next pitch, the Babe swung. There was a resounding report like the explosion of a gun. Straight for the fence the ball soared on a line, clearing the farthest corner of the barrier, 436 feet from home plate. Before Ruth left the plate and started his swing around the bases, he paused to laugh at the Chicago players ..."

Vivid imagery by Vidmer but nary a word about Ruth pointing to the bleachers to indicate where he would hit the next pitch. In fact, of the 100 or so writers who covered the game, only one, Joe Williams of theNew York World Telegram, said that Ruth had pointed to CF. And Williamslater recanted.

The myth of Ruth predicting his HR seems to have originated in articles by Bill Corum and Tom Meanythree days after the game.

Corum for the New York World Journal: "Words fail me. When he stood up there at the bat before 50,000 persons, calling the balls and strikes with gestures for the benefit of the Cubs in their dugout, and then with two strikes on him, pointed out where he was going to hit the next one and hit it there, I gave up. That fellow is not human."

Meany on the same day in the New York World Telegram: "Babe's interviewer interrupted to point the hole in which Babe put himself Saturday when he pointed out the spot he intended hitting his HR and asked the Great Man if he realized how ridiculous he would have appeared if he had struck out? 'I never thought of it,' said the Great Man. He simply had made up his mind to hit a HR and he did."

What about Babe himself? What did he say?

He is not quoted after the game as claiming he called his shot. In fact, when asked the following spring if he had pointed to the bleachers before he connected, he said: "Hell, no! ... Only a damned fool would have done a thing like that. If I'd have done that, Root would have stuck the ball right in my ear."

Unfortunately, "Ruth fell in love with the story" because "it was another jewel in his crown." He started fueling the fable. In hundreds of subsequent interviews, including tapes made for the Hall of Fame, he insisted he had pointed.

What about the other players?

C Gabby Hartnett, who had a front row seat for the drama: "If he had pointed at the bleachers, I would be the first to say so. He didn't say a word when he crossed the plate."

Cub 3B Woody English: "He didn't point. He was looking directly into our dugout. He never pointed to center. If he had done that, Root would have knocked him down."

Root, of course, was repeatedly asked about the incident. "If I thought he was trying to show me up, I would have knocked him on his tail. It's strange. I'm better known for that – for what never happened – than for the things that did happen."

Koenig, Ruth's pal from the '27 Yankees: "As far as pointing to center, no, he didn't. You know darn well a guy with two strikes isn't going to say he's going to hit a HR on the next pitch."

Did Ruth's teammates confirm the story?

LF Ben Chapman: "He was pointing at the pitcher. Someone asked him,'Babe, did you call that HR?' Babe answered, 'No, but I called Rooteverything I could think of.'"

C Bill Dickey: "Ruth got mad at that quick pitch [for the second strike]. He was pointing at Root, not at the CF stands. He called him a couple of names and said, 'Don't do that to me anymore.'"
When asked, "How do you know?" Dickey replied, "Because Ruth told us when he came back to the bench."
"How come you never told anybody?"
"All of us players could see it was a helluva story. So we just made an agreement not to bother straightening out the facts."

Reference: Baseball, Chicago Style: A Tale of Two Teams, One City, Jerome Holtzman and George Vass